After reading a bunch on better bidding to see what 4 star hotels people usually get in downtown montreal I decided to give it a try. I understood to put 2 adults / 2 children gives you a better chance of getting two beds but not a guarantee. You could also get a sofa bed or a cot. After I received my confirmation I called LE Westin to get some further info. I was informed by a very helpful person that she could not get any info on bed types. I expected that. I asked her how big the sofa beds were and she said they do not have sofa beds. I asked her about the cots. She said they are twin cots and two could not fit into a room. This left me a little concerned. Given I may get to the hotel and have two rooms with two double beds but I do have some concern. She also went on to say these sites are a gamble and not that best bet to get what you want. That sometimes if you call the hotel they can get you a price close to what 3rd party sites are offering. Out of curiousity I asked what the best rate she could give me was. I paid $121 for a room that can accommodate 4 (maybe 2 double, maybe a cot, sofa bed) le westin site has a king bed room for 145 a night le westin site had a room with 2 double for 166 a night Looks like I got a decent deal. However on the phone with Le Westin the girl said she could give me either room for 125 a night plus tax. I could of been guaranteed 2 double beds with adjoining rooms for 125 a night. Only 4 dollars more. You live you learn I guess. Moral of the story, if you can narrow your hotels down on hotwire ( i pretty much knew i was getting the westin, sheraton, or omni) you should really call them first and tell them you are about to order through hotwire, or that a friend just booked through hotwire and got their hotel for this price a night. And you were really thinking about staying there if you could get a similar or close rate. Most likely they will return with a rate only slightly higher. I don't think I got a bad deal from hotwire just letting everyone know my experience. After speaking with the lady at LE Westin I called hotwire to let them know what she told me. Not about the price she could give me, just that there are no sofa beds and the cot is only a twin and I was concerned about it sleeping 4. The lady at Hotwire was also helpful but couldn't do much. She told me that they would guarantee 4 people could sleep in a room and agreed that 1 bed (king, queen, or double) plus one cot (twin sized) is not adequate for 4 people. If I did only get one bed that I must have a sofa bed or at least 2 cots. She called Le Westin and they could not help her with the number of beds in the room. So she told me these were my steps. 1)get to the hotel and see what they give me. I might just get 2 rooms with 2 double beds. Nothing further necessary. Also try to get there as early to check in as possible 2)if there is a problem and I only get 1 bed and 1 cot to ask if an upgrade is possible for a fee. Then to fax that receipt to hotwire and they will pay for it. 3)if nothing could be done at Le Westin they would find us a similar hotel or better to accommodate us. So hotwire did nothing wrong and got me the lowest price for the room that was available. However now I will always contact the hotel first to try to get them to match hotwires prices. In this case I would of been able to guarantee 2 double beds through the hotel for only 4 dollars more. Even though the hotel listed the room on their site at 167 a night. Learned alot on how hotel sites work from this forum. Thanks.
